50 songs in 2:55

October 4, 2019 4:13 AM

1979 -- a mix of the year's music presented by The Hood. They plan to release one more for each of the following years over the next three Thursdays.

Music by ABBA, AC/DC, Anita Ward, Billy Joel, Blondie, Boomtown Rats, The Buggles, The Cars, Charlie Daniels Band, Cheap Trick, Chic, The Clash, The Cure, Donna Summer, Doobie Brothers, Earth Wind & Fire, Electric Light Orchestra, Fleetwood Mac, The Flying Lizards, Gang of Four, The Gap Band, Gary Numan, Joy Division, Kiss, The Knack, Kool & The Gang, Lipps Inc, M, Michael Jackson, Pat Benatar, Pink Floyd, The Police, The Pretenders, Prince, Queen, Rainbow, Rupert Holmes, Sister Sledge, The Specials, Squeeze, The Sugarhill Gang, Supertramp, Talking Heads, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, Van Halen, The Whispers, Wire

posted by dobbs (34 comments total)

Nice briefly seeing Ian Curtis in there...

I love this type of mashup very muchly. Pretty much just established my weekend playlist!
posted by chasles at 4:38 AM on October 4, 2019

This is a tour de force of both audio and video editing, not to mention how crazy deep their musical knowledge is. The Van Halen/Michael Jackson section was sublime!
posted by jeremias at 4:50 AM on October 4, 2019 [4 favorites]

Suppose today that there’s a kid out there who is just as talented as Prince: He or she can write great songs, play all their own instruments, and have off the charts charisma. I can see them becoming an Internet sensation for a while, but would it be even possible for them to become a superstar the way Prince did? I’m having trouble seeing how.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 5:03 AM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]

This is pretty damn awesome. Like chasles, I think I know what I'm listening to this weekend. IF there is a playlist on spotify or apple music out there...
posted by MrGuilt at 5:32 AM on October 4, 2019

would it be even possible for them to become a superstar the way Prince did? I’m having trouble seeing how.

I had the exact same thought when he died. I don’t think we’ll see another like him.
posted by STFUDonnie at 5:44 AM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]

Whoa. Listening to that evoked a strange, dreamlike feeling of partial memories through a haze of time—as though it really was 1979 again, and after a few joints and drinks I’d spaced out at a party where someone was playing All The Hits but I was just picking up bits. Oh yeah, there’s that MTV thing... wow, The Police... dance, dance, dance... oops upside your head...

Has it really been forty years? Oh, man. Good weed.
posted by kinnakeet at 5:46 AM on October 4, 2019 [7 favorites]

Yeah, if we sprung for a good DJ, this would be the actual soundtrack of my high school reunion*.

* With the party mercifully condensed into three minutes. "Oh, hi... [name tag]. Three kids and two grandchildren? Wow. Which way did they say the bar is? I'll be right back..."
posted by pracowity at 6:00 AM on October 4, 2019

as though it really was 1979 again, and after a few joints and drinks I’d spaced out at a party

I was expecting a Couples Skate.
posted by thelonius at 6:00 AM on October 4, 2019 [9 favorites]

We have another like Prince, his name is Lenny Kravitz. He still started pre-internet dominance. As you can see he is diluted comparatively such that people don't see his talent, his composition and his ability to build a library and a persona in a light even remotely comparable to Prince.

It is not that the music then was so much better, it is that the barrier to entry - the barrier to produce music is so low that someone either self-produces to improve their margin, while simultaneously record labels produce too many artists in order to cover their bases and mitigate risk of many artists failing. This also means many more producers and engineers and a lower talent bar set for the behind the scenes affecting artist's success as well. As such -we get a lot of decent noise presented as a great band... We conflate social media presence with actual presence. We conflate a spectacle with a show. We cannot discern talent because of choice. TLDR: We are blinded to greatness thanks to an excellent mediocrity .
posted by Nanukthedog at 6:09 AM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]

Everyone in 1979 just wants to party and Gary Numan is having none of it.
posted by gwint at 6:12 AM on October 4, 2019 [19 favorites]

this is the compressed soundtrack to long road trips in conversion vans with whatever church group or activity i happened to be with at the time.

Sugar Hill Gang and Michael Jackson bring back such vivid memories of a trip to Houston - crazy! Makes me want to call every one of those girls and schedule a 40th anniversary tour!
posted by domino at 6:15 AM on October 4, 2019

That was incredibly well done. The Van Halen/Michael Jackson part was just masterful. I would have liked to have heard (and not just seen) more women, though.
posted by Mchelly at 6:19 AM on October 4, 2019

Everyone in 1979 just wants to party and Gary Numan is having none of it.

He was not happy.

All my early songs were about being alone or misunderstood. As a teenager, I’d been sent to a child psychiatrist and put on medication. I had Asperger’s and saw the world differently. I immersed myself in sci-fi writers: Philip K Dick, JG Ballard. [...] I had a No 1 single with a song about a robot prostitute and no one knew.

posted by pracowity at 6:26 AM on October 4, 2019 [7 favorites]

As you can see he [Lenny Kravitz] is diluted comparatively such that people don't see his talent, his composition and his ability to build a library and a persona in a light even remotely comparable to Prince.

Honestly, I think that's because Kravitz's music feels intuitively derivative whereas Prince's music feels innovative.

I like Kravitz's music just fine, I just have never found anything he's recorded to be forward-looking.
posted by hippybear at 6:28 AM on October 4, 2019 [10 favorites]

That was awesome and I need like 45 more minutes of that.
posted by JoeZydeco at 6:47 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

I miss 1979. I don't really miss being 15 but that was a great era for music.

Where's Blondie? Eat to the Beat came out that year; both Atomic and Dreaming were favorites of mine then.
posted by octothorpe at 7:16 AM on October 4, 2019

Deborah Harry is at 2:31.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 7:22 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

Where's the B-52s ? We played Rock Lobster at our wedding in 1979.
posted by rfs at 7:32 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

Deborah Harry is at 2:31.

Right there on the list. Read it twice and didn't see it; should have CTL-F'ed.
posted by octothorpe at 7:34 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

Anyway happily listening to Eat to the Beat right now.
posted by octothorpe at 7:35 AM on October 4, 2019

"'Too Wild to Tame,' The Boys; 'Tumbling Dice,' Rolling Stones; 'YMCA,' Village People; 'Danke Schoen,' Wayne Newton; 'Straight On,' by Heart; national anthem by Francis Scott Key."
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:13 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

Tumbling Dice

That's from 1972. Didn't the Stones release "Some Girls" about 1979? Looks like 1978. Here you go for your end-of-decade Stones.
posted by thelonius at 8:23 AM on October 4, 2019

I wouldn't have minded a disco trigger warning before I clicked on that link.
posted by fairmettle at 8:26 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

It's great. I was a big fan of the Charlie Daniels Band in 1979. Also Kenny Rogers. What can I say? I liked and like songs that tell stories.
posted by chavenet at 8:26 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

I wouldn't have minded a disco trigger warning before I clicked on that link.

The thread is about 1979. You knew the risks. What were you expecting, Billy Corgan?
posted by thelonius at 8:31 AM on October 4, 2019 [15 favorites]

Here is some 1979 trivia: "Chuck E's In Love" is about a friend of Rickie Lee Jones and Tom Waits, back when they were a couple.
posted by thelonius at 8:36 AM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]

The last time DJ Earworm rounded up the top ~25 songs of 20xx, the curmudgeon in me piped up "ha, try that with something like 1978", when rock, country, disco, pop, ballads and funk competed in the top 40. And here it is.
posted by kurumi at 8:51 AM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]

"ha, try that with something like 1978", when rock, country, disco, pop, ballads and funk competed in the top 40. And here it is.

and it's brilliant, moment by moment, second by second ... but I can't help feeling the overall feel of this song (for it is it's own unique song in the end) is one of almost yacht rock smoothness. And 1979 was not that kind of year. Not in the vicinity of my ears anyway.

TLDR: nice mix but it doesn't bring the NOISE.
posted by philip-random at 9:03 AM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]

I'm going to fill my music collection with the 1 or 2 songs in there that I don't have...
posted by Chuffy at 10:47 AM on October 4, 2019

I was there, but only 11 and unable to process how excellent it all was. Wow, I want to go back there.
posted by Meatbomb at 12:52 PM on October 4, 2019

I wouldn't have minded a disco trigger warning before I clicked on that link.

The thread is about 1979. You knew the risks. What were you expecting, Billy Corgan?

They bought their tickets to the 1970s. They knew what they were getting into.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:11 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

Disco was on the wane by 1979 ... on its way back underground for a while.
posted by philip-random at 3:59 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]

The thread is about 1979. You knew the risks.

I had steeled myself for the actual disco hits of 1979 - - it was the overall discofication of the rest of the songs that I found disturbing.
posted by fairmettle at 2:38 AM on October 5, 2019 [3 favorites]

anyone know what the guitar line that we see being played at 2m20s is from?

Rupert Holmes - Escape (the Pina Colada Song)
posted by STFUDonnie at 5:33 PM on October 5, 2019